Chapter 19 Mark
He said he was taking care of a leg injury, but everyone actually knew what was going on.
Frequent incidents in the palace's backyard have already cost the young master many lives. Now, the Jintang is in jeopardy, with Ji Linyou within and Lan Xiurong from Fengyi holding hostile views. Mingjiu openly links him to his cousin's death, while a murderer lurking among the young masters, colluding with the rebels, is likely to attack him.
What's more, among all the gentlemen, the easiest one to attack right now is definitely the spoiled and injured Jintang. If you want to pick the weak ones, he will definitely be the one to be squeezed.
Seeing the county lady's care and concern, Jin Tang looked at her gratefully and nodded in agreement.
Ji Linyou glanced at him coldly, then leaned against the pillar with his sword in his arms: "Okay, then I'll live on the outermost side, farthest away from him."
Qian Deng said nothing. His eyes fell on the jade pendant on Jin Tang's waist and he asked, "Can I take a look at this jade pendant?"
Jin Tang hurriedly took it off and handed it to her with both hands, saying with annoyance: "If I had known this thing was so troublesome, I wouldn't have brought it with me!"
Qiandeng looked at the jade carefully, but he was sure that he had never seen a jade pendant with two dragons playing with a pearl before.
Cui Fufeng examined the lines of the pattern and said, "Although I have never seen this jade pendant before, the ancient and elegant knife technique seems familiar."
Qian Deng had no experience in carving, so he asked him to find out which famous craftsman had carved something like this. After all, this was a rare and exquisite piece of jade, and the person who had carved it must have a memory of it.
She returned the jade pendant to Jin Tang and asked, "Do you have any idea who went to Huangsha Valley at that time?"
"How would I know? This is the first time I've heard of the Yellow Sand Valley. And as far as I know, the court has never rewarded my family for transporting grain or anything like that. So suddenly bringing up something that happened eighteen years ago is just ridiculous, isn't it?"
"So, among your relatives, are there any who are about ten or twenty years older than you and look similar to you?"
Jin Tang was a little embarrassed to speak: "Quite a lot... My father's generation had seven brothers, and forty or fifty cousins, and even more descendants. Plus, my great-grandfather and grandfather had many children when they were older, so I have many uncles and cousins who are twenty years older than me. They are all merchants all year round. There are many people traveling the northwest route..."
Although a large family is a good thing for ordinary people, it also shows that his family has many male servants and concubines. In front of aristocratic families with strict family traditions such as the Cui family of Boling, it is inevitable that he will feel ashamed. For a candidate to be the husband of the county lord, it is even more of a disadvantage.
"For example, my seventh uncle is fifteen years older than me. I had a very good relationship with him when I was a child. I still remember him carrying me on his shoulders to watch the lanterns. Because we look alike, many people mistook us for father and son."
Qian Deng casually asked, "Is that the man Lan Xiurong married? What was his name? If he died ten years ago, he would have been around 25 or 26. Why didn't they get married?"
"My father's generation had the character 'Bao' in their names, and my seventh uncle's name was Jin Baojing. I heard he had someone else in his heart, so he'd never married. He was even against the Lan family's marriage proposal, which led to a falling out with my family." The county lord asked, and Jin Tang naturally answered in detail. "But the woman my seventh uncle liked was much older than him, and she was a widow with a lot of children to worry about. My family objected, so they wouldn't let him break off the engagement with the Lan family, let alone the widow bringing her young son into the family."
Ji Linyou looked impatient. Obviously, he only wanted to hear about the Huangsha Valley and had no interest in these trivial old stories.
Xue Xiyang showed a sneer on his face and said indifferently: "Oh, you are indeed the richest man in Chang'an. Your family is indeed upright and honest. You will never want orphans and widows."
Meng Lanxi, who was an orphan and a widow, stood in the shadow under the eaves, gently stroking Baibai in her arms, pursed her lips and said nothing.
Jin Tang was a little flustered and tried to explain in detail: "I was still young at the time and didn't remember the details. I just remember that my seventh uncle was punished and knelt in the ancestral hall for two days and two nights. I secretly brought him cakes to eat. He said goodbye to me and said he was going to the south with his sweetheart. But the next day, he fell off a bridge while riding a horse while drunk and died. Because he was unmarried and childless, he couldn't even enter the ancestral tomb, so my grandfather adopted him as his bloodline. But now that my grandfather has passed away and the situation is unstable, everyone seems to have forgotten about it. Last month during the Qingming Festival, I went to sweep the grave and burn incense at my seventh uncle's grave, but I found that the rain had soaked the grave. When I go back this time, I will definitely move him back to the ancestral tomb."
Seeing that these trivial matters of his family had nothing to do with the matter of the Yellow Sand Valley that he was pursuing, Qian Deng did not ask any further questions and only casually reminded him, "Okay, then you should rest early and take care of your leg injury."
Seeing that the county lady had no interest in talking to him, Jin Tang felt a little wronged but could only nod: "Yes, county lady, don't worry. I will lock the doors and windows tightly and not leave the room!"
Unfortunately, tonight is destined to be a restless night.
Qiandeng returned to the front yard and felt that after being busy and distracted, the pain in her foot seemed to have subsided. It was already late, Aunt Xuanji had gone to bed, and Daimao was busy with things at the farm. Qiandeng couldn't sleep anyway, so she stared out the window at the water pavilion high in the backyard for a long time. Then she simply picked up a lantern and headed there alone.
Since the end of last summer, when her wife passed away in the small pavilion, the gates had been tightly shut, and no one had passed through. However, as she approached the corridor of the water pavilion, carrying a lantern, she heard low voices, as if someone was talking.
The voice was very familiar. She raised the light in her hand and shone it over there. The two people who were talking also turned around. It was Cui Fufeng and Ling Tianshui.
The three of them met here and knew why each other came, so they just nodded to each other without saying a word.
Thousands of lanterns were held high, lighting up the mountain corridor below as the three of them walked up step by step.
The long corridor was silent, the small attic was closed, everything remained as it had been that day. Only the bloodstained floor had been cleaned. The dusty room was filled with the faint musty smell of being closed for too long, carrying with it the despair of his mother's death.
She took a deep breath, forced herself to calm down, held the lantern tightly, and let the light shine into the house.
Just as he was about to step into the room, a slight rustling sound suddenly came from the corridor below.
Ling Tianshui immediately turned around and walked towards the corridor following the sound. In just a few steps, he arrived at the source of the sound.
Just as he stepped onto the veranda, he heard a squeak and a black shadow the size of a palm ran past from under the veranda and into the rockery cave. It turned out to be a mouse.
It is normal for rats and insects to come out of the grass on the manor to look for food at night.
Ling Tianshui quickly chased after him, grabbed the pillar of the corridor with one hand, and when he was about to step on the mouse, he suddenly stopped.
Seeing that he hesitated slightly, Qiandeng raised the lamp in his hand and shone it on him from across the corridor.
He raised his hand in the moonlight, stroked the pillar of the corridor, frowned slightly, and motioned her to bring the lantern over.
Qiandeng and Cui Fufeng looked at each other, then quickly walked to his side and turned on the light to shine it over.
After wiping off the dust on the pillar, there were a few hastily made marks on the outside of the pillar.
The mark was on the outside of the pillar. Unless people in the corridor looked out or climbed onto the pillar like Ling Tianshui did just now, they would never have noticed the mark.
Because the marks are very small and subtle, people standing below and looking up cannot notice them, so they have never been discovered and it is unknown how long they have existed.
Ling Tianshui's expression darkened slightly as he gestured to Qiandeng to check the markings.
She didn't care whether there was dust on the pillar. She hugged the pillar with her left hand, leaned outward, and used the lantern in her hand to illuminate the pattern above.
It was a crude and simple figure carved with a small sharp object. Rough lines connected squares and circles, indicating the trajectory of action ahead.
That was a map of the terrain and layout that someone had casually written down after peeping into the water pavilion from this side.
The small attic room, the screened room, the platform in front and the pool below, the lines are simple but the indications are extremely clear, as if you can see the route the murderer took to sneak in.
Seeing these familiar carvings, Qian Deng and Cui Fufeng's expressions slowly became gloomy, just like Ling Tianshui's.
They all remembered that in Ji Linyou's book, they had found a random map he had drawn, and that he had left a carved symbol for Mingjiu in Princess Gao's mansion.
It is almost exactly the same as the mark left on the pillar.
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